


A Plan Gone Right

by MyOwnSuperintendent



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Mild Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-23
Updated: 2014-12-23
Packaged: 2018-03-02 23:57:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2830700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MyOwnSuperintendent/pseuds/MyOwnSuperintendent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Arya decides that she wants to have sex before starting college, she makes a plan to make sure that things go smoothly--and she decides that Gendry is the perfect person to help her out.  It isn't long, however, before her perfect plan begins to feel a bit more complicated.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Plan Gone Right

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own A Song of Ice and Fire or anything related to it. Hope you enjoy!

Arya couldn’t believe how screwed up everything was. It was unfair. She always got in trouble for doing things without thinking ahead, but now, the one time that she’d actually made a plan, things had gone wrong too. She didn’t know what to do.

She’d decided that it would be a good idea to have sex before starting college in the fall. It would solve a lot of problems. She was curious about what it was like, and if she did it now, she would know what it was all about and wouldn’t feel the need to satisfy her curiosity by hooking up with any gross drunk guys at parties. And no one would bug her about being a virgin.

On the other hand, she didn’t actually want to be in a relationship. Sansa was into that kind of stuff, not her. She wanted it to be with someone she knew, obviously, someone who wouldn’t make it into a big deal or tell everyone, and she wanted to do it more than once since she’d heard that the first time usually kind of sucked. But she didn’t want to go around holding hands and exchanging “I love you’s” or any of that. That wasn’t the point.

She needed three things for this plan to succeed, Arya decided. Condoms. A place where one of her seven thousand family members wasn’t going to walk in. And the right guy.

The first part was easy—she stopped in at CVS on her way home from hanging out with some of the girls from soccer and bought a box, which she stashed at the bottom of her underwear drawer. And the second and third parts came together.

She picked Gendry, of course. He was the guy she was closest to—she’d known him for what felt like forever. She couldn’t count all the times that they’d walked around the neighborhood together in the summer or kicked a soccer ball around. He never ratted her out when she did stupid shit, so she trusted him to keep this to himself, too. She was pretty sure that he wasn’t a virgin, which would probably make the whole thing less awkward, and since he was older, he had his own apartment—it was tiny, sure, but no one could walk in on them. Someone had to be her first, and she thought Gendry would be a good person.

She brought it up one afternoon in late June. They’d been walking around and had stopped for ice cream. As they walked slowly down the street with their cones, Arya said, “Hey, can I ask you a favor?”

“Depends on what it is,” Gendry said. “If it’s something crazy…”

“When have I ever asked you for something crazy?” Arya demanded.

“Pretty much every day of your life,” Gendry said. “But go ahead. What is it?”

“I want to have sex before I start college,” Arya said. “Would you do it with me?”

Gendry practically spat out his ice cream. It was one of the most ridiculous things Arya had ever seen. “What?” she asked. “Do you think I’m gross or something?”

“No…no…I don’t think you’re gross…but you’re too young!”

“I’m eighteen,” Arya said. “That’s not too young.”

“It is when I’m twenty-two,” Gendry said.

“Gendry, I have brothers who are older than you. And we’re friends. It’s not like you’re some creep off the street.”

“Exactly. We’re friends. I’ve…I’ve never thought of you as a girlfriend—”

“Oh, I don’t want to be your girlfriend, if that’s what you’re freaking out about,” Arya said. “I just…you know…want to find out what it’s like. And I trust you. Because you are my friend. And obviously if you really don’t want to or you’re going to be weird about it, we shouldn’t. But all I want to do is have sex like five or six times to find out what it’s like, and I really want you to be the other person. And I promise I won’t make it weird.”

“I…what if something happened, Arya? If I…if you…”

Gendry seemed too embarrassed to speak, and Arya wasn’t sure what he was trying to get at for a minute. Then it hit her. “Oh! You mean if I got pregnant? I got condoms.”

“Something could still happen, though,” Gendry said.

“Something could always happen, Gendry,” Arya said. “The world could explode tomorrow, and then you’d wish you’d gotten my sweet, sweet body while you had the chance.” She grinned at him, but he didn’t smile back. Maybe she had misjudged this. “Look, Gendry, if it really makes you uncomfortable, we can drop the whole thing and forget I ever said anything. But I really do want to do this. And we’d be as safe as we could be, and you would not be doing anything that I don’t want to do, and we’d both make sure that we didn’t make things weird. And then I’ll go to college in the fall and we’ll be friends like we’ve always been. Plus it would be really awesome if you said yes because you have your own place and I don’t know any other guys who do.”

“Oh, thanks,” Gendry said. “I see how it is.”

He was smiling a little now, at least, and she smiled back. “I’m just being honest. And trying to reassure you that I’m not going to get all emotional about this.” He was silent then, but he looked thoughtful, and Arya was sure that he was at least considering it. She waited as long as she could stand before saying, “Well? What do you think?”

“I…yeah. Sure. Fine. Okay.”

She felt a little like cheering, but Arya forced herself to be considerate. “Are you sure? I don’t want to make you do this if you’re really not into it.”

“No…I…it’s fine. It’s like you said. We’re friends. And knowing you, you are going to do this somehow, come hell or high water, and if I can keep you from epically screwing it up, that’s probably a good thing.”

“I would not screw it up!” Arya protested. “I am probably an untapped sex goddess.”

“Sure.”

“You don’t know,” Arya said. “But seriously, thanks. I’m…I’m glad you said yes.”

“No problem,” Gendry said. “I…when do you want to do this? Where? How?”

“I…tomorrow afternoon?”

“That’s fine,” Gendry said.

“I already told you where,” Arya said. “Your place, because you don’t live with Bran and Rickon. And as for how, I mean, I’ve never done it before, but as I understand it, you have to put your—”

“Shut up,” Gendry said. “That was not what I meant, and you know it.”

“Fine. How. Well, I’ll come over, and I’ll bring the condoms. And then we can just figure it out. You’ve done it before, haven’t you?” She’d been around for Gendry’s various girlfriends.

“Yeah.”

“So you can show me what to do. And…I think we should probably have some ground rules. So it doesn’t get weird.”

“Like what?” Gendry asked.

“Like...we’re not going to say anything couple-y. We’re allowed to talk about what we’re doing and if it feels okay and stuff like that, but I don’t want you telling me you think I’m beautiful or that I’m incredible or anything like that.” She didn’t really know what kind of things couples said. She’d gleaned most of what she knew from movies that Sansa watched, and a fair number of those seemed to be different versions of _Pride and Prejudice_ , which were useless. “And we’re just going to have sex. I mean, yeah, foreplay too. But not cuddling or hand-holding. Afterwards, we’ll…we’ll just watch some crappy movie and make fun of it. Is that good?”

Gendry nodded slowly. “Yeah, it’s fine.”

“Anything else you think we should put in the rules?” Arya asked.

“No, I think you’ve covered everything,” Gendry said.

“Good.” They walked on then, not talking about their plans to have sex, and wandered around the neighborhood for another half hour before they each headed home. “See you tomorrow!” Arya called as she left, and Gendry nodded and waved.

She went over to his building the next afternoon, armed with her box of condoms. She ran up the stairs after he buzzed her in and found him waiting for her at the door of his apartment. “Hey,” she said.

“Hey,” Gendry said. “Come on in.”

The place looked neater than it usually did. “Did you clean up for this?” she asked, and when he nodded, she said, “Hey! I thought we weren’t going to get couple-y. You didn’t have to make it special or anything.” He looked a bit upset at that, though, and she felt a little bad. “But it was nice of you. Really. But I have seen all your crap on the floor before.”

“I know,” Gendry said. “I just didn’t want everything to be gross. So…should we…you want to come in my room?”

Arya nodded. “Yeah. Let’s do it. I brought the condoms.” She pulled the box out of her bag.

Gendry looked at the box. “Jesus, Arya, that’s a huge box. How many times do you think we’re going to do it?”

“I…whatever…it was the cheapest!” Arya said. “Are you going to complain about my condom selection, or are we going to get down to business?”

Gendry grinned and punched her shoulder lightly. “Fine. Fine. Down to business.”

The whole thing turned out not to be too awkward, all things considered. Gendry knew what he was doing, and he made sure that she came before, even if she didn’t come during. It didn’t hurt too much—it was more weird than anything—and it certainly wasn’t particularly dramatic. They lay at opposite sides of his bed afterwards. “Was it okay?” Gendry asked her quietly.

“Yeah,” Arya said. “Yeah. Thanks for being good about it.”

“Of course,” Gendry said, and they were quiet for another few minutes.

She came over again later that week, so that they could do it again. She noticed this time that he was really good at kissing.

The third time, the whole thing felt more natural. She’d always been comfortable with Gendry, and that comfort was beginning to extend to sex with him. She could tell that he was seeking out the touches that felt good to her, trying to make the whole thing good, and she liked that. She’d definitely chosen the right guy.

The fourth time, he smiled at her during the sex, and she felt herself smile back.

The fifth time, she started to reach for him afterwards, without thinking, and when she realized what she was doing she pulled her arms back as if she’d been reaching for a hot saucepan.

The sixth time, she didn’t reach for him, but she really wanted to. _Oh shit_ , she thought, as she sat up and started putting her underwear back on. _Oh shit._

And so now here she was. Everything was totally screwed up. Because she wanted to cuddle with him afterwards. And she wouldn’t even have minded if he told her that he thought she was beautiful. But she couldn’t tell him any of that. Because he’d think she was totally stupid when she’d made such a big deal about not being a couple. And he didn’t want to be a couple anyway. He’d barely even wanted to have sex with her. This was just a favor, like she’d asked him for, and they were friends. Not anything more.

And she couldn’t even blame Gendry for this. He was a good friend—a really, really good friend. He’d made sure the sex was really good and comfortable for her. He’d followed all the stupid ground rules she’d come up with. He was too good—that was the problem. He was such a good guy that she couldn’t stop thinking about him, about kissing him and about holding each other close and other stupid stupid shit she’d never in a million years imagined she’d be thinking. She’d always ignored people who said that sex made you have feelings; that was stupid, she thought. Sex was just something you did with your body, like eating. Except now it felt like maybe it wasn’t, and maybe she shouldn’t have ignored those people.

She didn’t know what to do. She couldn’t even call Gendry, because a part of her really wanted to go over there and have sex with him again, and another part of her knew that that would be the worst thing she could do. She wondered if she’d ever be able to act normal with him. Because if she couldn’t—if they couldn’t even be friends—that would be the worst thing in the world.

And at some moments, it felt like not kissing him again would be the worst thing in the world too.

“You okay, sweetheart?” her dad asked her after supper one night. “You’ve been a little quiet.”

“I’m fine,” she said. “Just kind of tired, you know. Lyanna and I were playing soccer all afternoon.” She made a mental note to tell Lyanna Mormont that they’d been playing soccer all afternoon. “I think I’ll go to bed early.”

Her dad gave her a quick hug. “Sleep well.”

She was lying back on her bed, not sleeping at all, when the door to her room opened around nine. “Miss me?”

Arya sat up. “Not at all.” She watched as Sansa set her suitcase down next to the bed. “How was the whatever?”

“The whatever, by which I assume you mean my internship, was great.   I learned a lot, met great people, got some swag which I would share with you if you cared about clothing at all. How’s your summer been going?”

“It’s been fine,” Arya said, with the permanent ache somewhere in her stomach reminding her that it wasn’t fine. “Not really doing much.”

“Just hanging around with Gendry?” Sansa asked. Sansa didn’t mean anything by it, Arya knew—she and Gendry always hung around together, after all—but she found that she couldn’t answer.

Something must have shown on her face, too, because Sansa looked over at her and said, “What’s wrong? Did the two of you get in another fight?”

“No,” Arya snapped.

“Okay,” Sansa said. “You don’t have to be dramatic about it. You guys always make up in like two days.”

“We didn’t get in a fight, okay?” Arya said. Her voice sounded stupid and childish, and she hated it. She wanted Sansa to just leave her alone.

Sansa took a seat on her bed. “Seriously, what’s wrong?” she said. “And don’t just pretend everything’s okay.”

Arya looked at her older sister. They got along much better than they had when they were younger, but Sansa still sometimes felt like a creature from another planet. And yet this was Sansa’s planet, wasn’t it—liking boys and all that stuff? Maybe she should tell Sansa, especially since Sansa currently had that not-taking-no-for-an-answer expression on her face. And then Sansa put a gentle hand on her shoulder, and the words were out before she could stop them. “We had sex.”

“You…what?” Sansa’s face looked ridiculous.

“We had sex.”

“You and Gendry?” Sansa asked. Arya nodded. “Oh my God. Oh my God. Are you guys…are you going out or…?”

“No,” Arya said, and she felt like she was going to cry. “No. We just had sex so I could see what it was like but he was really nice and now I think I like him but we promised we wouldn’t so I don’t know what to do.”

Sansa looked confused again. “Wait. What? Start at the beginning, please. Details.” So Arya started at the beginning, and she told the whole story, with details. She figured it was best not to leave anything out, now that she’d started. Sansa was a good audience; her facial reactions almost made Arya laugh in spite of herself, and the way she squeezed Arya’s shoulders was kind.

“And now I don’t know what to do,” she finished up. “Tell me what to do.”

Sansa didn’t miss a beat. “Well, I think you have to tell him,” she said.

“I can’t do that!” Arya protested. “He’ll think I’m stupid. We made rules. I came up with them myself. I wasn’t supposed to do this.”

“Okay, fine, don’t tell him,” Sansa said. “And keep on being miserable, and never know if he feels the same way about you.”

“He doesn’t,” Arya said. “I told you. He didn’t even want to do this.”

“Oh, come on, Arya,” Sansa said. “He didn’t want to do this because he was worried about hurting you or messing things up between you. It had nothing to do with not being attracted to you. It’s so obvious.”

“How is it obvious?”

“It just is,” Sansa said. “He agreed, didn’t he? He wouldn’t have done that if he wasn’t at least the slightest bit interested.”

Arya bit her lip. “Maybe.”

“And you’ve just been telling me about how he made it so good for you. And how he smiles at you when you’re having sex, for God’s sake. And how he cleaned his apartment for you—and that guy is as filthy as you are, so that’s saying something.” Sansa leaned in and squeezed her shoulders again. “I can’t know if he’d like to go out with you, obviously. But from everything you’ve told me, I can see a guy who cares about you a lot. And you are obviously nuts about him. So I think you should go ahead and tell him that. Even in the worst case scenario, he’s Gendry. He’s been your friend for so long, and he’s not going to be a jerk about it. And in the best case scenario, he feels just the same about you, and you get to cuddle as much as you want, and he’s going to tell you you’re the most beautiful, amazing girl he knows.”

Arya knew she had it bad, because that sounded incredible instead of ridiculously stupid. “I guess. But…I don’t know…it’s hard.”

“Yeah, of course it is,” Sansa said. “But I think that it’s going to be so worth it. At least think about it, okay?” Arya nodded, and Sansa gave her a hug, which she let go on for a few seconds before squirming away. “Oh. One more thing. Can I be Mom for a second and ask if the two of you are being safe?”

Arya rolled her eyes. “Yes. We always use condoms. I wasn’t stupid about that, at least.”

“Don’t beat yourself up,” Sansa said. “Everyone does stupid things when it comes to guys. I mean, I went out with Joffrey. You do not have the monopoly on doing stupid things in this family.”

“Yeah, but you dumped him.”

“Yes, I did,” Sansa said, smiling. “And it was pretty epic. And it’s going to be epic when you tell Gendry that you like him.”

Arya shrugged. “We’ll see.”

“It is,” Sansa insisted. “I have a feeling.” She sat down on her own bed and began taking off her shoes. “I’m going to take a shower now. But it’s good to see you again. I missed you, even if you didn’t miss me.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Arya said.

Sansa stuck out her tongue. “You love me.”

She thought about Gendry that night, and she thought about Sansa’s advice, and eventually she decided that she had to take it. She couldn’t let it go on like this. She wanted it settled, even if it meant seeing everything blow up around her (although she hoped Sansa was right and that wouldn’t happen, because the thought of having Gendry mad at her made her feel kind of sick). She called him in the afternoon. “Hey,” she said. “Do you want to…um…hang out today? Not at your place. Just…walk around like usual…maybe get ice cream or something?”

He agreed, and they met up at the ice cream place, where they’d stopped the afternoon she’d proposed this dumb idea in the first place. They each got a cone, and they started down the street.

“So I wanted to talk to you about something,” Arya said. “I…um…sorry, this is going to be really weird…you know how we set ground rules?” Gendry nodded. “Yeah. Well…um…I don’t…I don’t like them.”

“Sorry?” Gendry said.

“Yeah, I…I said I didn’t like couple-y things, but…I don’t know…maybe they’re okay.” Gendry was looking very confused, and this was a terrible idea. But she had to keep going now. “I mean…oh, God…I think I…no, I know that…I like you, Gendry.” There. “I mean, I guess you know I like you, like we’ve always liked each other, but I…I want to be with you. I really like it when you kiss me, and I want to do stupid couple stuff, and I think it was really nice that you cleaned your apartment. And I know you probably don’t like me, and that’s…I mean, that really sucks, but whatever, because I said we shouldn’t…but I like you and I thought I should say something.” Her ice cream cone was dripping, and she licked at it frantically, glad to have an excuse not to look him in the eye.

“Arya.” He didn’t sound mad, at least. More surprised. “I…I didn’t know.”

“I didn’t want you to know before,” she said. “But I…I thought I should tell you now.” He was quiet then, and she couldn’t stand the tension. “Look, just tell me how you feel,” she said. “And if you don’t like me, we can pretend this never happened.”

He looked at her then, and the expression on his face was so sweet that she could barely think. And then he pulled her against him and kissed her, a full deep kiss, and it felt incredible for the two seconds until his ice cream cone slipped out of his hand and fell down her back.

She shrieked and jumped away, dropping her own cone in the process. “Fuck, Gendry!” she shouted. “Fuck! That’s really cold!”

“I’m sorry!” he said. “I’m sorry! Here.” He tried dabbing at her back with a napkin, which didn’t seem to do any good. “God, I’m so sorry,” he said. “I…I guess I ruined the moment.”

She was about to say something snarky, like yeah, she guessed he had, but then she stopped to think. “No,” she said. “You didn’t.” And then she pulled him close and kissed him again, and this time there was nothing to interrupt them.

When they finally pulled away, he was smiling at her again. “You’re pretty amazing, Arya,” he said.

“You too,” she said, and she smiled when he took her hand in his. She had no idea what was going to happen now, but she was pretty sure that it was going to be good.


End file.
